Perfect Fiancé Chapter 55

From a distance, no more than a few centimetres away from her face, the man's enlarged face had frowned. With an unsatisfied mien on his face, Su Jin slightly tilted her head back and dragged her stool a little further away. She then stood.

With the seat before him vacant, Lu Xi's long eyebrows were slightly cached as he straightened up and held his hand out towards Su Jin.

"Huh?" Tilting her head to a side, Su Jin was somewhat confused.

"Let's go." Lu Xi's thin lips curled up a little as he expressed clear and bright laughter in the depths of his eyes, "if we are here like this any longer, then I really would not be able to resist."

Resist what?

Su Jin was startled but this query of hers, she paused before asking it.

What would he not be able to resist?

In the guest seats at the banquet of the graduation evening party, the girl had been engrossed with this phrase and flung her anger away to ask in curiosity.

Hearing this, the man chuckled lowly.

"I would not be able to resist and try to–" With a slight change of his facial expression, his voice turned low, deep and elegant.

"–kiss you."

Those alluring peach blossom eyes met with her phoenix eyes with deep laughter in them.

As her thoughts churned in her mind, Su Jin's face pinked; did she still need to ask what he could not resist doing?

"Pervert." Raising her eyes, she glared at him as she spun around in full intent to leave the room.

Pervert?

The girl's cheek had reddened a little and when those innately curled phoenix eyes glared at him, they showed a gleaming reflection from within. As if it were a refreshing puddle of clear water, her eyes were filled with light that was similar to limpid ripples in a green lake.

With a raise of his eyebrows, Lu Xi's hand that had stilled in thin air held onto the girl's arm. With a light use of strength, the girl had then been spun and fallen into his embrace.

Unexpectedly caught off guard by a sneak attack from him, in a valiant effort to maintain her balance, Su Jin's arms had wrapped around the man's neck. When she recovered her senses once more, there was already a pair of arms curled around her slender waist.

"Hey!" She reproved lowly while struggling a little; yet, she was hugged even tighter and she had decidedly given up in trying to free herself. Raising her eyes to look at the man before her, she blinked those phoenix eyes, "the party is about to begin, we should go down."

"Pervert?" Lu Xi did not pay heed to her urging and merely raised an eyebrow at her as he bent his body over a little.

Su Jin's height was not really low either and today, as she was wearing a pair of high heels on her feet. With her being intimately taken into Lu Xi's arms and embrace, as he leaned his body forward that slightest bit, the tip of their noses were practically in close and intimate contact.

Somewhat sluggishly blinking her eyes, Su Jin saw those familiar peach blossom eyes abruptly looming before her; those eyelashes of his were long and thick and in the depths of those eyes, a dense fog of laughter had little by little shone through.

"A hara.s.sment would be something a pervert does.” His sharp, straight nose softly rub against hers as he curled his lips, "as for me, this is called–"

That warm breath fell upon her ears and when Su Jin had come back to her senses, his lips had already turned to linger at her ears.

"–no longer being able to control my feelings."

That warm and rich voice, it was like an old, excellent wine; with just the aroma of the liquor alone, it could make one entirely enraptured and be unaware of the pa.s.sing of time.

The familiar aroma of that girl's hair lingered at his nose.

As Lu Xi pressed his body over, his lips had gently fallen on the white jade-like earlobe before him. He then withdrew himself as he stood upright.

The distinct breath of that warm touch had unexpectedly made Su Jin distracted as she reached out to pinch her ear with a rather dumbstruck look on her face.

With such a lovably naive yet adorable look on this young girl, Lu Xi could not help but burst into a smile as he reached out, wanting to pat her head. Only, he saw that she had a complicated hairstyle and could only stall this thought. So, that raised hand of his had then changed its focus as it tugged on the girl's soft hand (which had been pinching her earlobe). Once in his grasp, he interlocked his fingers with hers; only with this, was he satisfied and remarked.

"This is interest."

Interest? Could there also possibly be a princ.i.p.al amount?

Su Jin was stupefied and could help but reach out with her hand to rub against her twitching temple.

This fellow, where was his pride?

"Let's go, it's about time already." With a broad grin on Lu Xi's face, he pulled onto Su Jin's hand as he walked out the door.

Holding hands, the two people walked down the staircase and in the wink of an eye, the somewhat lively living room had strangely fallen silent.

The perfect pair.

A pearl and a fine jade. In this very instant, to the surprise of everyone present, they could no longer think of any other fitting phrase for them.

Seeing the pair come down, Su Chenghai had waved a hand to them as he walked towards the temporarily-built stage for this occasion.

Due to Shenhai being at his home grounds, this time the engagement party was hosted by Su Chenghai.

"Firstly, I would like to thank everyone for coming today," Su Chenghai said while standing by the microphone, "everyone present today is all of my Su family's kin and kith. Since this is so, then I will not say any further."

"Lu Xi, Xiao Jin," he gave a beckoning hand to the two people just off stage, "come on up."

Curling a hand around Lu Xi's arm, Su Jin walked up the stage and stood behind Su Chenghai.

"These two at my side, one is my eldest daughter Su Jin and the other is Lu Xi from Beijing's Lu family." He gestured to the two people behind him with a deeply moved expression, "that year, my Father and Lu Family's Elder were old friends and had set a betrothal arrangement for our families' younger generation. Before Father had pa.s.sed away, he had informed us of this matter. After discussing this with Brother Lu[1] for a while, we had intended to have two of our children interact with each other. If there was an affinity between them, then that would be in accordance with the cherished desires of these two elders."

[1] 世兄 (shì xiōng) – This is a deferential appellation of a peer from the same generation who usually has their elder family members being longtime good friends. However, this does not mean that they would be as close as the Lu and Su grandfathers who are good friends all this time; it just means that Su Chenghai had discussed this matter with Lu Xi's father in a cordial and amicable way, rather than as strangers. 

"Now that more than half a year has pa.s.sed, although there was already a betrothal arrangement, these two children do have some mutual interest in each other. Still, such an arrangement would be considered illegitimately conferred[2], therefore, Brother Lu has brought his family over. Through discussions between us, our two children have planned this engagement party.”

[2] There are varying degrees of arranged marriages wherein Lu Xi and Su Jin's could be considered as a consensual arranged endogamous marriage. It is one where a third party finds and selects the bride and groom from a particular social, economic and cultural group. However, the keyword of note here is consensual means that both parties of the marriage have agreed to it. While during their grandfather's times (before the 1980s), a forced arranged marriage is legal and binding, now there is a 1980 Marriage Law in China that abolished the feudal marriage system, which included arranged marriage, male superiority, and the disregard for the interests of children.

Due to Lu Xi's ident.i.ty, the matter of his hospitalization after the car accident was something known only to the two families. Thus, it had not been spread out to the public and today, they had used this engagement ceremony as a smokescreen have a legitimate reason for the Lu family's appearance here.

"Lu Xi." Su Chenghai turned around and looked at them.

With an upright expression on Lu Xi's face, he took a step forward as he bowed to him slightly, "Uncle Lu."

Su Chenghai nodded slightly as he pulled his daughter and spoke to Lu Xi, "I will be handing Xiao Jin over to you. If you turn your back on her, then my Su family will be very willing to throw away our pride to withdraw from this marriage too."

For families like theirs, every move and action had represented their pride and family reputation; so much so that at times, their movements could even affect the rise and fall of stock prices. But if Lu Xi had not been very compatible with Xiao Jin, then he would even stake all of the Su family to dissolve this betrothal arrangement.

However, while he was getting along well with Lu Xi thus far, and was still rather satisfied with this future son-in-law, an appropriate amount of beating a drum and hammering this point down to him like this was certainly a necessity.

"Uncle Su, please be rest a.s.sured." Lu Xi had straightened his body and unfalteringly, he met the eyes of his future father-in-law, "I will not allow anyone to harm her, including myself."

He had not made any vow but had merely made a simple comment. However, his tone was extremely serious.

Staring at him for a long while, Su Chenghai's lips curled and finally, he lightly sighed.

"Xiao Jin", he lightly touched some of the fallen long tresses at his daughter's back with a rueful expression and lightly remarked, "you've grown up now. In the future, you must have a man who can take Dad's place in protecting you."

"Dad……" Su Jin tugged on his shirt hem and trickle by trickle, those memories that should have only existed in the recesses of Su Jin's memories had floated to the top of her mind and her eyes had suddenly reddened.

"Alright, alright." Seeing his daughter's slightly reddened eyes, he hastily smiled, "it's just an engagement. There's still some time to your marriage, your Dad can still protect Xiao Jin for a long time."

Seeing Su Jin reveal a smile, only then did he take his daughter's hand that was in his and placed it onto Lu Xi's palm.

As that pair of hands interlinked together, Lu Xi held the girl's little hand tightly and let out a deep sigh of relief. Pushing down the surging tide in the depths of his heart, he expressed a smile on the edge of his lips.

This was the figure that he had placed in the depths of his heart for a thousand years, she had been engraved with all of his persistence and his yearning.

Initially, it was only so he could bring her back to life.

Yet, never in his wildest dreams did he think that he would meet her soul in his final mission.

From that very moment on, he had become mad already.

A completely new ident.i.ty and a close family- although the her who had already known about the storyline had all her guards up towards this world and its setting. In an entirely new and foreign place that had no one who knew of her past; this will naturally make her feel safe too.

It was not like her past experiences were unbearable, however, having her guards up for the longest time had made her initially (already) apathetic heart become even more cold and detached. Apart from Aunt Fu, there was no one that could make her care about them anymore or to take to heart seriously.

Some things, some emotions because of the fear of being hurt, even the slightest chance of making a connection with someone else, she would not even leave such hope for herself.

But, what if this was an entirely brand new world? What then? No one would know about her origins and no one would be able to probe into her past. She was the most doted upon eldest young lady that had been the apple of the family's eyes. Moreover, with her knowledge of the book's plot and sufficient ability and status to protect herself, she no longer needed the defences she once had to do so.

In her subconscious mind, as long as she was able to rea.s.sure and verify that she could defend herself- only then would she be able to consider other emotions and think about accepting another person.

And this, would be his chance.

Not one person would have known how much those hidden emotions in the depths of his heart had actually rose into a tumultuous tsunami that had threatened to swallow up the skies in that very moment. After his epiphany of this state of events, no one would know how he had so unyieldingly and forcefully had these overwhelming and overbearing undercurrents locked and sealed deep in the depths of his heart.

However, even with his preparations beforehand, at that moment when he had heard Xiao Qi point out the beginning of the plot, it still remained hard for him to control himself. Even after restraining himself for a long time, in the end, he had still entered the story ahead of time.

Their first meeting at the airport.

In fact, it could not be considered their first meeting.

Ever since he had known that Su Jin had been replaced with Su Jin'er, whenever he had the time through Xiao Qi, he would have a look at her.

Seeing how she was bewildered and helpless at first and then seeing her little by little get used to this new ident.i.ty; seeing her delicately beautiful facial features and her smile upon her face that was like a flower.

Through that icy-cold screen, it was in sight but remained unattainable.

Later, he finally was by her side.

Those pair of truly familiar eyes.

Those distinct yet slightly curled phoenix eyes that were filled with clarity- apart from three measures of curious sizing him up, in the depths of those eyes, what remained was indifference to matters that were of no concern to herself.

Just like how in this millenia of time, how her figure had been like as she had countlessly appeared in his dreams.

Frantically, he had wanted to step forward, had wanted to firmly pull her into his embrace and had wanted to have her meld into his bones and blood; to never be apart.

Yet finally, he could only calmly grasp her hand and land a gentle kiss on the back of her hand.

"Jin'er." He raised her right hand in his and receiving the little ring from Su Chenghai, slid it onto her middle finger.

"Wear this first, wait until you've graduated, then I'll give you another."

He had said this very casually and his voice was light so probably only those three people on the stage had heard this clearly.

Looking at the ring on her middle finger, Su Jin noted the sleek design and the minimalistic and elegant hidden etching; there was no pompous diamond on it, just little small diamonds embedded on it which had formed into an abstract pattern of the character L.

L? Her facial expression twitched as she took the other ring that was in her father's hand and slid it onto the middle finger on his right hand.

As expected, those small diamonds had formed an abstract pattern similar to the letter S.

However…… Changing another after graduating?

Would that be a wedding ring then?

Su Jin's heart leapt as her lips curled into a smile. As she stealthily turned her head, she took a glance towards her own old man.

Ah, as expected. His face had darkened.

Translated by Irisu

Edited by Mino and Tokyo

Kekeke, Papa Su, he is such a doting father~

Here are some comments from Maripaz: I only joined perfect fiance for a very short stint but I'm happy it gave me an excuse to binge read the chapters. It was cute and fluffy but with an extra sci fi sort of twist that kept it interesting. A big thank you to Iris who was so accommodating and organized! To Ely who caught all the little grammar slip ups and to Minodayz who led me to this whole team! I'll never read Phoenix eyes and peach blossom eyes the same way again!